


the waves that lap against the shore

by Shampain



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Backstory, F/M, Odesta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-22
Updated: 2015-03-22
Packaged: 2018-03-19 00:27:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3589464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shampain/pseuds/Shampain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finnick falls in love: a tragedy in five parts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the waves that lap against the shore

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BeesKnees](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeesKnees/gifts).



whore.

 

Snow waits until Finnick is sixteen before he tells him how life is going to be. Finnick supposes Snow thinks he is being kind by offering him a chance to seize the opportunity, for whatever it is worth. After all, man about town is a far prouder title than rented whore.

Finnick has a pretty face, which hides all sorts of things, like the sharp, glittering intelligence that seethes behind it. Mags once told him that he had the eyes of a shark, back before Mags stopped talking. It was some of the best advice he had ever been given and he had spent a long time in front of the mirror, smiling, until he was satisfied that it had gone away.

It disturbs him how quickly it becomes easy, going to bed with people. It is almost easier than killing.

 

seventy.

 

Finnick Odair's pulse flickers a second too quickly every year at the Reaping. He thinks back to how stupid he was, and how scared; and then he remembers that he still is terrified, every day, until the end of his days, and his heartbeat slows, and he goes back to himself.

He smiles for the cameras. He feels like Death.

He is nineteen and a girl who has no business with murder finds herself on the train with him to the Capitol. She is quiet, but intelligent. Finnick doesn't know how to talk to her and so he leaves it to Mags, instead busying himself with the boy. He tries to keep himself separate. If any tribute dies in the arena from his district, it's not his fault. _He_ survived, didn't he? If he can do it, so can they.

He doesn't expect either of them to come back, and neither does Mags. They sit and watch, because they had agreed they would do so together. Mags takes Finnick's hand. They watch as Cresta tries to die in the most limp and undetermined way imaginable. Finnick is almost disgusted.

But then the dam breaks, and she is the only one to float to the surface. His fingers flinch around Mags' hand, and it's only then that he realizes he is relieved.

 

neighbours.

 

He gets to know Annie Cresta better before the Victory Tour. Her house is next to his in Victor's Village. She comes over sometimes without warning, bearing gifts. Apples, salted cod, cookies, a book. It's like she doesn't think she can go anywhere without offering an entrance fee.

Finnick thinks about suggesting that they do something to her face. It is too pretty; soon Snow might tell her the same thing he told Finnick. Perhaps scars would help dissuade the president – but Finnick knows deep down that, for some people in the Capitol, scars would simply do the opposite.

She doesn't talk much. It takes Finnick awhile to realize that she visits him because she is scared, or hasn't been sleeping. The idea that he could bring solace to anybody surprises and unsettles him and when he first understands this he moves awkwardly around her. He has never comforted anyone before.

Eventually, her gifts start to annoy and then anger him. Is she paying for his time, just like all the rest of them? Her presence in his home is frustrating – so quiet, unassuming, and yet he looks at her and he sees everyone else in the world, another mouth that is there to consume him.

He doesn't answer the door the next time she knocks. When he thinks she must have gone he looks out the window and sees her standing at the end of the walkway, and though she is facing away from his house it is obvious by her shoulders that she is unsure.

The breeze gently lifts her long hair. It undulates like the waves that lap against the shore. She is alone and lost, a tiny boat in a dead and silent sea. Finnick can tell that she doesn't know what to do now that he has refused her. The sound of her screaming comes suddenly into his memory, that haunting sound that ripped from her throat the minute her fellow tribute was decapitated. Blood had flecked her face. The footage had been replayed a lot, once she had won.

Finnick opens the door. “Hey Annie,” he says. “I was upstairs, sorry.”

She turns to look at him. She knows that Finnick is lying, she must, but a smile comes to her lips and her eyes. There is no anger in her. She will never in her life bear a grudge.

“Hello Finnick,” she says. She holds up a small, cellophane-wrapped parcel that she had been clutching in her right hand. “I brought you some peanut brittle. I thought you might like it.”

That's when Finnick realizes that Annie Cresta brings him things because she wants to make him happy. For the first time in a very long time, he suddenly is.

 

it's a mad, mad, mad world.

 

Finnick watches Annie on the Victory Tour. He watches as she breaks down. It's almost worse than the Hunger Games, because at least during that broadcast the interest had been divided, Annie even being written out through the whole thing as not even a contender for the victory. In this Tour, all cameras are pointed at her face.

She stumbles through her speeches. Their escort is a slim and dangerous man, who has little patience for a Victor so obviously shaken. In District Eight she starts to scream, hysterically, looking up at the faces of the dead tributes with their families collected together, like some sort of morbid zoo.

 _I should be there_ , Finnick thinks. He goes to Mags' house, where she feeds him a blueberry muffin, makes him a cup of tea, and strokes his hair. Somehow, Mags feels more like a mother than his real one, because Finnick's mother doesn't know what it's like to feel someone's blood splatter across your face. His mother doesn't know what is truly inside of Finnick's heart.

 

creeping up.

 

The years turn, moving onwards. Finnick and Mags and Annie spend a lot of time together. Other Victors of District Four keep their distance; they only come across one another in the Village, or when they have to do events for the Capitol.

Finnick cherishes his time in District Four, where his body belongs to no one but himself. But when he goes to the Hunger Games – he must always go, even if it's not his turn to mentor that year – there is nothing left that belongs to him, except for his heart.

Annie's soft, pretty looks make it so that the faraway expression in her eyes is less of an issue. He feels sick when he thinks about how she sometimes finds herself in the bedrooms of selfish Capitol citizens, alone except for her thoughts. Yet she is not so in demand as him, and she can only sustain one or two visits per season before her instability starts to show. Even Snow understands there is no point in using his Victors past the point of usefulness. Annie Cresta is already beloved, viewed with great sympathy by the Capitol, and Snow treads carefully around it.

Finnick watches her closely, every year. He monitors her whereabouts even when he shouldn't. And then every year, after the bloodbath, they all go home.

One year, on the train, Annie sits next to Finnick and falls asleep on his shoulder. Her hair tickles the side of his neck and her breath is a soft, wispy thing on his arm. Mags brings them both a blanket. When the train stops and Annie wakes up and the moment is broken, he is never more unhappy; when she smiles at him, sleepily, he forgets why he was upset.

Finnick's heart no longer belongs to him.


End file.
